Tag Archives: BA.

Shares that like April

The following table lists the five FTSE 350 shares that have the best returns in April over the last ten years. For example, Fenner has an average return of 9.11% for the month of April. All stocks have risen in April for at least eight of the past ten years.

Shares that dislike April

The following table lists the four FTSE 350 shares that have the worst returns in April over the last ten years. For example, Balfour Beatty has an average return of -4.4% for the month of April. All four stocks have fallen in at least eight of the past ten years in April.

An equally-weighted portfolio of the above strong April stocks would have out-performed every year an equally-weighted portfolio of the above weak April stocks by an average of 7.3 percentage points in April for the past ten years.

The FTSE 100 Index was launched on 3 January 1984. The market capitalisation weighted FTSE 100 index replaced the price-weighted FT30 Index as the performance benchmark for most investors.

Price performance

The following chart shows the price performance of the FTSE 100 Index 1984-2013. A simple linear trendline has been added.

The index was launched in 1984 with a value of 1000 and closed 2013 at 6749. This is an increase of 575% over the 30 years, giving an annual growth of 6.57%.

The trendline calculates a value of 6695 for the end of 2013, which is just 54 points away from the actual value (less than 1% difference). As can be seen in the chart, the FTSE 100 Index is pretty much bang on its long-term (since 1984) trend.

Fascinating Footsie Facts

Number of companies in index

100

Market capitalisation, average (£m)

18,253

Market capitalisation, standard deviation

24,837

Share price, average (£)

12.93

Number of companies paying a dividend

96

Dividend yield, average (%)

2.92

Dividend yield, standard deviation

1.29

PE ratio, average

20.2

PE ratio, standard deviation

14.2

PEG, average

2.3

Turnover, average (£m)

14,674

Turnover growth last five years, average (%)

76.2

Turnover to capitalisation ratio, average

0.88

Number of companies making a profit

94

Profit, average (£m)

1,534

Profit growth last five years, average (%)

101.6

Profit / turnover, average (%)

16.9

Current ratio, average

1.29

Net cash, average (£m)

5838

Net cash, sum total (£m)

566,363

Price to net cash ratio, average

24.2

Net borrowings, average (£m)

-1710

Net borrowings, sum total (£m)

-165,902

Net gearing, average

1.00

Interest cover, average

70.0

ROCE, average (%)

50.1

ROCE, standard deviation

107.6

Original constituents

The following table shows the 30 original companies that are still in the Index today. (The 19 italicised companies have been in the index continuously since launch.)

The following chart plots the average monthly out-performance of the shares over the FTSE 100 Index since 1994. For example, on average BAE has out-performed the FTSE 100 by 1.3 percentage points in March.

Observations:

The strongest months for BAE relative to the market have been March and September (the shares have out-performed the market in September in 13 of the last 19 years).

BAE shares have been weak relative to the market in October; the shares have only out-performed the market in October in seven of the past 19 years.

The 2013 edition of the Almanac looks at the historic monthly performance of the FTSE 350 sectors. The following chart looks at the aerospace and defense sector.

The chart plots the average out-performance of the FTSE 350 aerospace and defense sector over the FTSE 100 Index since 1999. For example, since 1999 on average the aerospace and defense sector has out-performed the FTSE Index by 0.9 percentage points in January.

Observations:

The strongest month for the aerospace and defense sector relative to the whole market has been March, while the weakest has been November.

The sector is generally stronger in the first half of the year, after which performance tails off.

The eight stocks in the FTSE 350 Aerospace and Defense sector [NMX2710] are: